Watching the Films of Brian Helgeland

This weekend sees the American premiere of 42, a biopic of the American baseball player and race pioneer Jackie Robinson.

It’s written and directed by Brian Helgeland, the writer of some of some very good films in the last two decades – LA Confidential and Mystic River among them.

LA Confidential starred Russell Crowe as a good man with a fierce temper – a character type he’d go on to repeat in Gladiator, American Gangster, and real life.

Writing for the Ann Arbor Review of Books, I’ve reviewed six of his more notable films, all of which he wrote, some of which he also directed. Those films are LA Confidential; Payback (also directed); A Knight’s Tale (also directed); Mystic River; Man on Fire; Green Zone.

Yes, you read that right – the same man who wrote LA Confidential and violent revenge fantasies Payback and Man on Fire also wrote and directed the tale of a jousting knight, set to Queen’s We Will Rock You.